


Waves

by dracomalfyaoi



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Ficlet, Light Angst, M/M, just like some imagery tbh
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-28
Updated: 2018-02-28
Packaged: 2019-03-25 05:43:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 838
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13827720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dracomalfyaoi/pseuds/dracomalfyaoi
Summary: A short description of Bucky's experiences after the Potomac.





	Waves

There’s waves of cold, dark water closing over his head after his body breaks the shouldn’t-be-sharp surface. There’s waves of blood in the water, thin wisps that float, dreamlike, somehow visibly red in the waves of black that consume his vision.

There’s waves of pain through his arm that he holds stiff and close to himself, through his whole body, really. He’s been trained not to acknowledge pain, trained to redefine his scale of pain, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t still feel it.

That’s just what they think.

Waves of fear, of something unfamiliar once he drops the unconscious ( _but still breathing, thank god he’s still breathing)_ body on the bank of the Potomac. Of nausea, at seeing the gut wound, at knowing he’d put that there on the first man since 1991 to call him a _name_.

Waves.

The pain had been steady and strong, but understandable, like the waves of the water he’d pulled them both through to get to air. Big, bigger than himself, but they followed laws of nature and he could navigate them. He could stand, and breathe, and start walking in the other direction from the man on the ground, dragging just himself through the waves this time but still feeling the weight of two people.

The memories aren’t like that.

At first they’re like the blood; people didn’t tend to know this outside of his line of work and experiences, but any kind of cut— life-stopping to only stinging— brought forth blood in waves, not streams, as the heart beat (sometimes failingly) and sent more blood through the body, and sometimes out.

In waves.

The memories were like the blood in the water. He knew they were produced in waves; he could feel the steady pounding in his chest and his head that he knew facilitated every function of his body, but the memories were wisps, ghost, colors warped and dimmed by the blackness, the water, the waves that tugged and tried to drown him.

Waves of panic, when a bird taps on the newspaper-covered window, when his neighbor taps on the door to ask to borrow a cup of sugar (he didn’t have sugar, wasn’t sugar rationed? Wasn’t a sugar ration worth much more to trade for bread or vegetables that kept the weight on Steve much better than some lumps of sugar ever could?). Of breaths he has to count, of something big and strong and mean wrapped around his ribs that he has to fight so he doesn’t drown in all of it.

Waves.

Of tears when he’s turned away from the first firework, so he only hears the _boom_ and sees the red light wash over everything  l ~~ike fire, like blood, over _everything_~~ , when the second one explodes blue in front of him this time and he remembers that he’s missing Steve’s birthday.

Waves of questions that physically roll through him, leaving him shaken and breathless when the tide recedes and he’s left with pages of memories and images and more questions than answers.

And waves of hope; small at first, rare, and shallow, like the waves that form on a still lake only because there’s life teeming inside of it, creating movement from the center, from the depths, that carry out all the way to shore. They get bigger, more frequent, until the hope is like the sea in a storm; huge, crashing things that he can’t possibly fight, that overwhelm and control him, that bring him wherever they wish regardless of his will.

That bring him back to Steve.

More waves of fear, of nausea; he thinks he’s going to throw up when Steve stares at him with eyes blue like water, with waves of emotion that move too fast over his face for Bucky to identify.

Waves.

Of tears racking Steve’s body, of guilt racking Bucky’s, of words left unspoken for too long (for these seconds in the kitchen, those months after the river, those years before).

The first thing that isn’t a wave is when Steve hugs him. Bucky freezes at first, unsure how to react; it’s the first secure thing he’s felt in a long time. Steve’s arms are big and strong, but they’re warm and heavy and solid, holding him in place for once instead of rocking and pulling him through the darkness. It’s like the ground after the river; the ground that holds him up, that he wants to cling to to keep away from the water, the ground that promises breaths of fresh, clean air, of walking away from the water and never coming back. He feels the tremor in Steve’s arms, that first glimpse of unrest in the water, and quiets it by raising his own arms and wrapping them tight around Steve.

It’s not like the water that filled his lungs, that crushed his chest. The hug is tight, but it’s like the unyielding land, solid and there. Always there, never leaving again, never leaving him to drown again.

It’s what they promise each other.

 

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first time posting in a collection or filling a challenge, I had fun! Hopefully I'll do something longer next time. I hope anyone who reads enjoys!


End file.
